Falling Stars
by Stormhunter117
Summary: As the council reactivates the X-COM project and dozens of brilliant men and women from across the globe are sent off to form perhaps the most important coalition force of all time, Delta operator Clark O'Reilly looks to the skies for answers to questions decades in the making.


" **Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe, or we are not. Both are equally terrifying."  
** \- Arthur C. Clarke

 **Falling Stars  
** **Operation: Marauder  
** /Declassified under ISD2-6 -phnx

The dropship buckled against the winds, throwing Clark against the flight harness. The four engines just outside gave off a constant, echoing roar, their fury barely contained and channeled. The dropship's cramped hold, barely lit by the craft's backup lighting strips, was empty, save for the single soldier hooked into the otherwise empty netting. Occasionally, the calm, bored voice of the pilot came across the intercom, saying things like: "Big Sky is enroute, the package is aboard. We're comin' in from the north-west, heading one-three-five, over."

The exchange sounded so standard, so normal. It almost was. "Got a contact, heading two-seven-three, Central, he one of yours, over?"

Reports were coming in, more by the hour, it seemed. Disappearances, mutilations. "Copy that, Central, we're going to ground, maintaining heading one-three-five. Dropping to four hundred meters."

UFO sightings, saucer-ships, the militaries of the world no longer claiming them as their own, and digital media of little grey aliens. Humanity was no longer alone in the universe. The voice of Big Sky drifted back, "Might want to strap yourself in back there, soldier. It's been a smooth ride so far, but it's about to get a little hairy."

Clark O'Reilly grimaced and notched a couple of additional hooks of his harness into the netting. "Sir, our ETA?" he shouted.

"We're forty-five, give or take two, out," the pilot said. Then he added, "Banking to starboard, hold on tight." The ship shuddered, and then leaned to the right, plastering Clark against the netting. Two seconds, three seconds, four seconds, and then the pressure eased. "Central, acknowledge new heading, one-three-eight."

He groaned as he peeled off the side of the loading bay. Eventually, the pilot called back, "Get ready back there. We're entering the traffic pattern." Clark checked his watch— it had been 40 minutes. Not too bad, to be honest, and then Big Sky remarked, "Say again, Central, another stop? That's cutting it close, sir— fuel is at two-three, over." The pilot paused, receiving instructions. "Wilco."

 _There hadn't been much warning_ , Clark mused. January of the new year, 2015, had passed with little notice, at least to the civilian population, and had looked to be normal, or at least well within the limits of sanity. And then, on February 3rd, the first report of strange disappearances hit the front page of the internet. A week later, the first UFO recording, not a shaky, low-resolution phone-camera with some glowing lights, but a quality, steadied, high definition shot, almost went viral. And then another. And another, and suddenly the governments of the world could no longer ignore the situation at hand. Powerful people panicked, pulling back troops all across the globe to defend against an enemy no one had seen coming.

"Descending," Big Sky said, jolting him out of his reverie. Clark gulped and held on tightly to the rigging as the dropship seemed to fall like a stone.

"—Entering ground effect, gradually increasing power to three-two," Big Sky rattled off. A checklist. The dropship shuddered tremendously, buffeted by the powerful vortexes of the engines. "Afterburner off. Descending at 5. 20 meters. 15. Aligning to header three-four-five..." he said, and Clark felt the ship spin like a top.

"Ten meters. Five—" The dropship kissed the ground— "—zero. Throttles to standby, dropping the ramp." The hatch hissed, and then it slammed down on the runway. Clark shivered as a wave of cool, dry air hit him like a brick wall.

He paused, squinting as his eyes adjusted to the sun's glare off the tarmac. _Is that..._ Clark blinked. He could just barely make something out through the glare off the pavement— the tail of a fighter jet. _That's definitely a Chinese character._ "Big Sky, where are we?" Clark asked.

A chuckle drifted back over the intercom. "That's classified, but I will remind you that we left Ramstein AFB at zero-one."

Clark's watch still said 0154L, and Ramstein was in Germany. He whistled in appreciation. "That's insane, man."

"Don't I know it. I was just assigned to this gig yesterday," came the reply, and then the pilot, that insufferable son of bitch, laughed as Clark's eyes went wide. "Oh, man," he said in between chortles, "you should _see_ the look on your face!"

Clark gave the loading bay camera a withering glare. "Laugh it up, funny man." He shook his head. They had just flown a hypersonic dropship, probably at like mach 20, across the world in thirty minutes. _That motherfucker._

Clark shivered again, and not from the cold. This kind of tech wasn't even in the rumors.

The sound of boots on the ramp caught his attention. Their owner hooked her duffel into the netting and stood across from him. Clark blinked, giving her a once-over: blonde hair, blue eyes. Tall; 5'11 at least. She was slender, and her build revealed her as youth; he gave her 22, 23 at the oldest. Her nametag read _WALKER, Athena_. Underneath, the line, _Who Dares, Wins_ was stitched in golden thread.

"What kind of sneaky-beaky work are you doing out in China, Walker?" he asked.

She stuttered, pushing a lock of hair behind an ear, and Clark chuckled. He raised a hand. "Don't answer that. Clark O'Reilly, Delta."

She blinked, looking at his outstretched hand, and then, as if she suddenly remembered how to be human, took it and smiled a small smile. "Athena Walker, Special Air Service," she replied softly in British-tinted English. "My apologies, Mr. O'Reilly," she continued. "It is not common courtesy to shake hands in the East."

Clark opened his mouth to respond, but the sound of the engines revving up drowned out any reply he could have made. The pilot's voice came over the intercom. "Next stop, Shumarinai National Park, Hokkaido, Japan. Five minutes out." The dropship's engines roared, and slowly, painfully, they took off.

There wasn't much else to look at in the belly of the dropship. Clark glanced at Walker curiously. In the dim light given off by the loading bay's emergency strips, her hair went white and her skin seemed almost translucent, _like a, like a... like a ghost._

The aircraft buckled hard to starboard, Walker almost coming free of the rigging.

"—evading, Central. Stand by."

Clark's heart skipped a beat. _Another UFO?_

Big Sky came across the intercom. "JASDF fighters flying a low-level pattern, we'll be going around."

The rest of the trip passed relatively uneventfully. After an eternity of chest-pounding banks and stomach-churning dives and climbs, the hatch dropped once again, revealing an awe-inspiring vista. A cool breeze wafted inside. Birds chirped.

"Good luck, sir," a curt female voice said in unaccented English. "You won't need it, though; you're in good hands." The owner of the voice stepped in view of the ramp, a nondescript member of the JSDF in black fatigues, a pair of yellow bars and a single star pinned on her shoulder marking her as an LT. She peeked inside and nodded at the two of them, then turned her attention back out. "Heard this flight got delayed by a training op out of Hofokita. If you like, I can—"

"No need," another voice, distinctly male and older, Clark estimated late forties, replied. _Australian?_ He couldn't quite make out the accent. Over the quiet hum of the dropship's engines, waiting and ready, he couldn't hear what was said next, but the JSDF officer frowned and shook her head.

"Bryant is maintaining tight interagency PERSEC, sir, and I don't think he's going to change his stance."

Clark heard the crunching of boots on gravel, and the man walked around onto the ramp. Average height, close-cropped black hair, brown eyes. Clark recognized him. Brigadier Tavers, United Kingdom Special Forces. He'd worked a couple of joint operations in Afghanistan with units under Tavers' command and had seen him in passing at some of the briefings.

"I understand. Tell him that I greatly appreciate his contribution to the program— I understand that from what you've told me, it's a sizable measure of your own resources."

"That's correct, sir."

The one-star smiled and turned to his aide. "Well, then, it's been fun, Lieutenant Kaga. I hope we meet again." They exchanged lazy salutes, and the LT stepped back off the ramp as it began to ascend.

"At ease," Tavers said as he walked up the ramp. He threw on a harness and hooked himself into the netting beside Clark as the dropship's engines flared and the ground buckled beneath their feet.

Big Sky keyed the intercom. "Next stop, Mt. Osorakan, Hiroshima. ETA 0803 Local."

The dropship's initial ascent was the worst part. They desperately clutched at the netting, some god-forsaken number of g's pressing them against the deck. Tavers let out a pained chuckle as the ship leveled out. "So get this, soldier. The goddamn spooks who got us the Skyranger thought it was a good idea to send us the fucking seats in the mail. They're at the fucking base! I'm gonna hang the bastards."

Walker grinned. "Is that so, sir? They worked hard on those seats."

Tavers frowned, squinting at her nametag. "Walker...Walker, Walker, Walker," he repeated to himself, "did we work an op together?"

"Yes, sir. I believe it was POSTURE, sir. Sweden," she said. Clark could barely hear her over the noise of the ship's engines.

The general nodded sagely. "Right. Last year... I was still Colonel. You were working HUMINT for that one, right? That was some good stuff you did with Mulder's aid."

Clark shifted uncomfortably as the dropship hit some turbulence. Tavers chuckled. "O'Reilly, the way I see it, internal 'operation security' is already blown to bloody hell and back. There's friggin' aliens out there!" He slapped the soldier on the shoulder good-naturedly. OPSEC was vitally important, a rule drilled into their heads from Day One.

But the general had a point. Clark smiled in resignation. "Sir, if I may ask, what did the JSDF contribute to, uh, the program?"

"Roger that," Big Sky cut in over the intercom. "Starting descent." This time, the landing went a little smoother. Clark finished untangling himself from the netting as the hatch hissed and slammed down onto the deck, and followed it, boots ringing as they impacted the metal.

His jaw dropped. They had landed in some kind of hollowed basin, an empty cylinder at least three hundred meters high and eighty across. Technicians scurried about a pair of fast movers lined against the wall, welding, wiring. As he watched, a section of the wall three stories up peeled back, another aircraft inside.

Clark swung his gaze skyward just in time to see the sky disappear, the bay doors sliding together across the opening.

Tavers stepped up beside him. "Well, son," he said, giving the bay a onceover, "they gave us a home."

* * *

Tavers frowned. "Time to get to work," he said under his breath, and he walked off. Walker came up beside me, duffel over her shoulder.

"Oi! Doctor Shen! Where are my goddamn seats?"

The two soldiers on the ramp exchanged bemused glances. "You've worked with Tavers in the past, right?" Clark said. She nodded. "Is he always like this?"

Walker shook her head. Her mouth worked the air for a moment, and then she bit her lip. "It's just how he is among the grunts. Otherwise, he's very erudite."

An older woman in a white lab coat walked past the Skyranger's ramp, arms crossed. "Hurry up, hurry up, I don't have all day!" she said, and in her wake a pair of workers pushing a large black container gave chase.

A man in a green pullover waited patiently as the for the technicians to pass. Brown hair, brown eyes. He wore a black earpiece, with a folding mic. On his breast, a patch proudly declared "Vigilo Confido" atop a globe with an X through it. He looked young, but Clark recognized him as well— Jonathan Bradford. He was a Major back at JSOC, did a lot of the behind-the-scenes work that helped make Operation: Mountain Fire a reality.

For the millionth time, Clark cursed the idiots who came up with the op names.

Bradford stepped up to them, and the two nodded to each other. "O'Reilly."

"Major. Good to see a familiar face."

"They call me Central now, Staff Sergeant. And you'll be seeing quite a few more." He swung his gaze around to Walker. "And you must be Ms. Walker. You have quite the reputation." They shook hands.

Walker's eyes widened. "I do?"

Bradford chuckled. "No, of course not. No one's even heard of you, but since the Commander personally pushed for your reassignment, the rumor mill's been churning them out, a dime a dozen. You know how it is."

"I do."

Clark frowned, but Central turned and waved for the two of them to follow. "Come, I'll get you guys sorted."

They made their way across the hanger, the two US soldiers exchanging small talk, Walker following a few steps behind. The bulkheads were divided by sliding doors and security personnel that made way to Bradford's keycard, and with each swipe Clark could feel them going deeper and deeper into the mountain.

"Okay," Central said eventually, "That was the last checkpoint." He motioned for them to continue past him into a large, open atrium.

In the middle of the room, an enormous holographic representation of Earth floated, conjured into existence by a bank of what looked like floodlights arranged about the room. Around the globe's base, a team of officers worked, keyboards clacking.

Bradford came up beside them and poked Clark with something metallic. "Here are your tablets," he said, pushing one into Clark's hands. "They have general assignments, barracks, armory code, medical, that kind of stuff."

Clark shoved his free iPad into his bag as Central paused, a hand to his earphone. "I copy," he said, and turned to us. "For now, you guys should get settled. The commander plans to address the program at 1200, so you're free until then. I'll have someone escort you around until I can get you your IDs— the machine's broken." He pulled out his own datapad and began typing.

"I watch, I believe," Walker murmured. Clark raised an eyebrow. "I—uh," she stammered, "It's what his patch says. Vigilo Confido."

Clark turned back to the hologlobe as Central waved down a member of security. For a moment the symbolism was too painfully obvious for him, and he shook his head, feeling the beginnings of a headache coming on. "This is fucking crazy."

Walker shrugged, arms crossed and eyes far away.

The guard came over, a bright-faced youth dressed in beige fatigues. He took them down a flight of stairs, past a series of labs and workshops. There was quite a few civilians on base, Clark was beginning to realise. More than just the standard logistics support of overpaid overachievers, looking to cash out on the quick raise that combat-work demanded.

The guard, a man named Dias, pointed off to one side, where the hall opened up. "Over there's the cafeteria. Just past it are the bunks. Gym's on the other side," he finished, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder. "Private for you guys, so I can't give you a look around."

He scratched at his back idly, and Clark tried to give him a reassuring smile. "No problem, kid. Honestly, I'm beat. Gonna rack out before Tavers' big speech." He had been up since oh-five yesterday, having to write a dozen reports before shipping out.

Walker grinned. "I'm going to keep exploring. Can you drop my bag off?" Clark nodded, and she turned to their escort. "Private, you mind?"

He chuckled. "Anything that keeps me off the sarge's radar is good in my book. See you," he added.

They waved their goodbyes. For a moment, Clark stood there, staring at their retreating backs, and then he turned, hefting both duffels—his and Walker's own— over his shoulder. Dias seemed like a good kid. Good English for a SAF grunt. At least, Clark thought, he thought he was SAF— he had that distinctive Spanish accent, but not too much of it.

The white fluorescent lights of the cafeteria stood in stark contrast to the soft halogens of the corridors. Clark blinked a couple of times, eyes adjusting as he passed through, taking care to not hit anyone or anything. A couple of tables were filled by workers and researchers. He exchanged nods with some of them, but most were too engrossed in their discussions.

Clark shrugged as he made his way into the next corridor. He'd never actually had to work in such close proximity to the R&D department before.

The barracks door opened to his approach, and inside, the corridor forked down the gender line. He left Walker's bag just inside the female threshold and pushed the male door open.

There, the door opened up into something Clark was infinitely more familiar with— a moderately sized room, filled from wall to wall with stacked wireframe bunks. There were a couple of doors on the other side of the room, marked sequentially. Probably for the VIPs, if he had to guess. Clark dropped his duffel and boots at the feet of one the unclaimed bunks before climbing up into bed.

Clark groaned and stretched, feeling the muscles unwind. The mattress was quite nice. This was a well-funded op— _speaking of..._ he mused, _just what in the hell have I been dragged into?_

Some kind of anti-alien operation? Must be, but this sort of installation, a veritable CMAFB, wasn't made in a month. And that dropship was something else. Tech that should be thirty years or more down the pipeline was being called up.

 _No doubt about it_. If they hadn't known about the aliens before this— and apparently, all they had was a motto stating they watched and believed— the governments of the world were quite the paranoid bunch. Clark chuckled. Nothing new there. Briefly, he wondered who else he would be seeing on this op. Hopefully Jackson and his limp-dick group of idiots— one of them was always telling stories about how his grandaddy got abducted by a men in black suits for 'knowing too much.'

A siren blared, and Clark groaned in confusion. _When had I_...

"O'Reilly, report to the armory. O'Reilly, report to the armory."

He blinked. Evidently, he had been more tired then he had anticipated.

Clark let out a yawn as he slid down the ladder. A asian man in beige fatigues surveyed him from the door as he put on his boots.

"Hey, do you mind showing me to the armory?" Clark asked, brushing sleepers out of his eyes. "I only got in—" he checked his watch— "-three hours ago."

"That's what I'm here for," the man replied. "Hurry it up, time is wasting."

 _Don't have to tell me twice,_ Clark thought.

"The name's Sato," the guide offered up. Slight accent.

"O'Reilly, but I'm guessing you already knew that."

He nodded. "I did. Here," he said, and they turned a corner. Lying in wait was a sight Clark was infinitely more familiar with— an armory. Behind the counter, a nondescript security staffer pointed at the two soldiers.

"O'Reilly, get suited. You're due at the hangar two minutes ago."

* * *

"All right, listen up," Bradfor—no, Central said. Over the roaring noise of the Skyranger's quad engine array, the CO rattled off a list of mission-critical information: "Approximately T minus two ago, several unidentified impacts were recorded in Hamburg. The FSLK200 recon dispatch has been recorded MIA. We have reclassified unknown bogies as intelligent, almost certainly extraterrestrial. Strike-One is tasked with recovery and recon, over."

A shiver went down Clark's spine. _Dodged a bullet._

At the front of the dropship's loading bay, a woman raised a hand to her helmet. "This is Strike-Leader. Copy that, recovery and recon, over."

Thankfully, the squad was strapped into a series of flight harnesses that came down over theirs shoulders and locked the soldiers securely into place. No more of that damn jostling. Apparently, Doctor Shen, whoever that was, had gotten them installed.

The soldier to Clark's left adjusted her harness. She looked familiar, but he couldn't place her. She was asian, probably Japanese. Clark scratched his head. _Maybe we met that one time I was stationed in—_ He shook his head. That was pushing the boundaries of plausibility.

The comms crackled. "Good luck out there. Central out."

"All right." Strike-Leader said. "This is so fucking stupid. New guys!" She pointed down towards the very front of the ship, where Clark was seated. "Introduce yourselves."

"Clark O'Reilly, sir! Delta!" he shouted back, thinking hard. She had a point. There had to be reason why the Commander had assigned two fresh faces to the squad. Even a couple of days of practice together could mean life or death in a combat situation. Across from him, Walker shouted back her own designation.

"Okay. Now the rest of you guys go at it." Strike-Leader said. "I'll start. Holly Jenkins, also of the SAS."

Across from her, a dark-skinned man waved. "Juan-Martin Martin. MOE." He had some kind of med-kit clipped to his harness. Clark resisted the urge to laugh. Poor guy must have kicked too hard in the womb.

The soldier beside Clark nodded at him. "Midori Kato, JSFG," she said coolly.

He squinted at her. After a couple of seconds, he shrugged. "Have we worked together, Kato?"

"No."

Oh.

On the other side of the aisle, the last soldier raised a hand. "Jack Morelli. DEVGRU."

"You sonuvabitch," Clark said, a grin on his face. "How the fuck did we get assigned the same damn op?"

"You know you love me," Morelli replied. "Don't worry, no one authorized heavy ordnance for this one. I got nothing to blow up this time."

"Thank JFC for that."

Jenkins clicked her mic, calling for the squad's attention. "I've just gotten a heads-up from Big Sky: We're landing in five." She paused, gathering her thoughts. "Just going to say this: I knew some of the guys who went missing." Her voice was quiet. "Anything that could have taken— anything that could have—" She stopped and frowned, eyes glued to the opposing bulkhead. "Look, we're bloody professionals. This isn't anyone's first time around the block... But still." She looked down the aisle, meeting eyes with each of them in turn.

"I'm not the Commander. I don't have an inspirational speech to give you. We're heading into a situation full of unknowns. But here's one thing that I do know: Shoot first. Let the scientists back home ask the questions."

For a minute, the strike team sat in a solemn silence. Then Clark felt the dropship buckle underneath his feet and Big Sky announce the start of their descent.

* * *

They touched down hard and the ramp fell to the street with more force than Clark remembered. Then Jenkins was banging down the ramp and the squad moved in line behind her.

It was drizzling in Hamburg. Clark breathed deeply as he dashed into cover behind a sedan. Big Sky had landed them in what looked like the middle of a riot— entire swaths of the street were lined with craters and covered in flames, while a pair of damaged police cruisers at either side of the street silently flashed their emergency lights, some kind of solemn vigil for whatever had happened here.

"Eerie," Morelli whispered. "Central, you picking this up?"

Clark cast a glance over his shoulder. Morelli was poking at what looked like one of those green plastic toy soldiers, except this one was life size and distinctly... fuzzy. The poor man— or woman— was sprawled out on the sidewalk. He kneeled down and checked its pulse. "Still alive."

Another voice came over the radio, this one female and German. "Strike-Four, if you could take a small sample of that green substance and hold it up for a brief visual inspection..."

"Got it."

Clark turned his attention back in front. Jenkins had quietly made her way to a covered bus stop and was sighting her rifle on the windows of the warehouse at the end of the street. She turned back and gestured for him to join her.

He quickly darted forward and pressed his back up against the bus stop beside her. "Hit me."

"Nothing yet, O'Reilly. Take the other side of the street for a moment while I—"

" _Kuso._ Central, I have a man down over here. Looks like a member of the recon team." Across the street, a dark figure— almost certainly Kato, unless Walker had decided to start swearing in Japanese— walked out from behind an overturned bus. Behind her, Martin reached for his medkit, but Kato shook her head and turned back to cover the street.

"Acknowledged," Central replied. Jenkins winced. There was nothing more to be said, and as Jenkins pulled back into cover, Clark leaned around the other side, eyes sweeping every corner. Twenty meters in front of him, some kind of silvery capsule was embedded in the street. Clark eyed it for a couple of seconds through his rifle's scope before deciding it was probably no threat.

Lightning flashed overhead, briefly illuminating the street. Clark cursed and pulled back into cover. Jenkins glanced at him, wide-eyed. "What is it?"

He grit his teeth. "Something in the bus stop itself. Didn't see it at first. Gonna check it out." He braced himself, and then he surged out from cover, toggling his flashlight as he went.

 _Fucking hell._ Slumped in the far corner was another soldier from the recon team. He advanced on it, rifle raised, but there was no point. He toggled his comms. "Central, Strike-Five. I have eyes on another member of the recon team." He took another hard look at the man, who looked like he'd taken a grenade point-blank. He frowned after a moment. "It's odd, though. Looks like he's been dead for a week."

The female German came over the radio again. "Strike-Five, if you do not mind, please give me some light. I would like to see this for myself."

 _You're a long ways away, lady— oh._ Right. Strike-team's helmets were each embedded with cameras relaying directly back to HQ. He brought his underslung flashlight around to bear and looked directly at the poor guy.

After a few moments, the comms crackled again. "I agree with your conclusion, Strike-Five. However, what is more interesting is the cause of death. It appears that he was... _eviscerated_ , when something burst out of his chest."

Clark had barely finished getting that through his head when another voice echoed over the radio.

"Central, Strike-Leader. I'm picking something up over an encrypted frequency." Jenkins poked her head around to take a look at the dead soldier and immediately regretted it. "Something we used to use on joint ops. You'll want to hear this."

"Strike-Leader, Central. Go ahead. Pass the torch to Big Sky, over."

"Copy that." She began reading off information into a private channel, and she had barely finished when some kind of ungodly wailing screeched over the line. _Sounds German_ , Clark thought, before shaking his head at his own idiocy. He couldn't make it out though— too garbled.

"Doctor Vahlen, did you catch that?" Central asked.

This time the female German voice— Dr. Vahlen, it seemed, was subdued, almost grim. "I did. He was saying... _help me._ "

The rain pitter-pattered against the concrete for a moment. Then Bradford spoke.

"Strike-team, Central. The signal is coming from the warehouse just north of your position."

"Acknowledged. Strike-Leader out." Jenkins came up beside Clark. They glanced at each other. Then Jenkins squared her shoulders and raised her wrist mic. "You heard the man. Morelli, I want you and Walker at the windows. Kato, take Martin and give Vahlen a good look at _that—"_ she gestured at the weird capsule in the street. "I'll take the door with O'Reilly. Move it."

The warehouse was old, not a glorified metal tent but a brick and mortar construction with almost floor-to-roof windows. Morelli came up to the edge of one such window and peeked inside. "Looks clear. Seems like they were clearing this place out just before all this. You've got good cover just inside." Walker double-tapped her mic, confirming the same on her side.

Jenkins nodded to herself. "On my mark, then. Walker, you, then Morelli after we're in cover." She placed her hand on the doorknob. "Three, two, one, _mark_." She pushed the door open and Clark pressed through quickly, rifle raised. Nothing leapt out of the darkness at him and he quickly pressed his back up against a forklift, one of the pieces of solid cover Morelli had described. The rest of the squad filed in, taking positions adjacent.

Clark turned and peeked his rifle over the top of the forklift. In the center of the warehouse, a single dangling light illuminated a crate of oil drums— and the boots of a man, standing at attention. The rest of him was cast in shadow, but Clark could clearly make out the silhouette of a rifle in one hand and a grenade in the other.

He ducked back into cover. "Strike-Leader, you seeing what I'm seeing?"

She clicked her mic in response. "Let's move up. Doctor, can you try to talk him down?"

"I will do my best."

The man's radio crackled as the team moved into closer cover, behind wooden crates and empty metal drums. At the end of Vahlen's attempt, the soldier released another anguished wail.

"He appears to be in shock," Vahlen said slowly, her voice wavering.

"Jesus Christ," Clark whispered to himself. He glanced over at the rest of the squad. Jenkins and Martin had their rifles trained forward on the man, like Clark, with the rest of the squad covering the room. He saw Walker take a deep breath and mouth something to herself. Her eyes flickered to meet his briefly and then back out into the room. Slowly, she brought up two fingers and mimed a slash across her throat.

Evidently, Jenkins was thinking something along the same lines. She motioned for Morelli to step up and disarm the man.

Strike-Four stepped out from behind a pallet and crept slowly up to the soldier, his rifle steadied and ready to fire at the first sign of trouble.

There was none. Morelli straightened as he closed to just a few paces away. Then, suddenly, he raised an arm up to tilt the dangling light into the man's face.

"Holy fuck!" he cried out. Clark couldn't get sight of what exactly was wrong, but it didn't matter, because very quickly, very suddenly, the soldier brought up his rifle and triggered the underbarrel shotgun twice, emptying dozens of pellets into Jack Morelli. Then he raised his other arm, the one with the grenade—

" _Brace!"_

END


End file.
